Words for My Enjoyment

If I Was An Evil High School Guidance Counselor

July 10th, 2006

“Collecting garbage is a noble career,” I might say.

And then while I leaned down behind my desk (where I’d purposely dropped a pen and a handful of paperclips just so I could hide my face for a moment) I would smile a smile so wide it would keep me satiated far better than food ever would. It would make me giddy and happy and I would be laughing a laugh so laughable inside that my lower intestines would grow muscles from the constant exercise.

Yes, being an evil high school guidance counselor would be extremely rewarding.

I would do my homework at night, of course. Preparing for my meetings the following day with James R., and Bridgette L., and John and Suzie and Jenny and Garth and so on and so on and so on. The names wouldn’t much matter to me, but the skill and irony in which I would pick future career suggestions out for each of them would.

Kevin D., the child of a vet and an Greenpeace volunteer would have an extremely successful future as a whaler. The advantages of living on a boat, exploring the world and making a great new group of gruff friends on the high seas would fully eclipse the fact that harpooning the ocean’s most regal creatures would potentially, maybe, cause some chaos back at the homestead. Oh, and there would be Lorraine B., the daughter of a local politician and lawyer — whose destiny was most likely tied to starting her own business where she would get ten friends to pony up $10,000 and then those friends would get ten people to cough up the cash and so on and so on. And Tourette’s syndrome-afflicted Barry S? Well, it would be obvious that a career in public speaking would be his forte, don’t you think?

I would be so evil that I probably wouldn’t even attend faculty lunches.

When a snot-nosed holier-than-thou high school student would sit before me, I would engage the battle of words with such skill that each and every one of them would enter with one career future in mind, and leave with another firmly implanted in their cerebellum. Lawyer would become brick layer. Communication director would translate into construction foreman. Opera singer would become food slinger. Dentist, orthodontist.. The road from the beginning to end would make me extremely giddy and entertain me to no end:

Me: “So, what kind of career are you interested in?”
Them: “I want to be a lawyer.”
Me: “Lawyers are crooks. How about being a crook instead?”
Them: “A crook? But I want to be a lawyer.”
Me: “Yes, but laywers are wimps. No one respects them. Didn’t you ever hear the joke about ‘what would you do if you found a lawyer unconscious on the highway with a slew of cars quickly approaching?”
Them: “No…”
Me: “You leave him there! Hahaha.”
Them: “What kind of crook did you have in mind?”

I would have pamphlets and bookles and leaflets on a slew of careers the kids might be interested in, but I would glue together all the pages of the careers I didn’t want people to take. After spending ten frustrating minutes trying to read leaflets on being a lawyer, doctor, air force commander and politician — most students would give up and read the ones about being a Union negotiator, sewer cleanser and highway reflective dot placer instead.

And in their minds they would think it was all their idea.

My pencils wouldn’t be #2 pencils, but would be made of a high grade contaminated lead that if broken off in the finger of any of my students, would cause their fingers to swell to ten times the normal size. I would keep my office windows closed tightly, causing the air to thicken and hang there in an attempt to cause a noxious bath of soupy atmosphere. All chairs would be molded plastic instead of those $1,000 ergnomic chairs. Because if you left a meeting with me, the evil high school guidance counselor, feeling healthy? Well, then I just wouldn’t be doing my job.

The other teachers would wonder aloud just why I still had a job.

Of course, in hushed tones they would all know the reason. For since I would have photos of Mrs. Miller and Mr. Diamond sleeping together in the parking lot back behind the soccer field, they would understand why. And Mrs. Weber, the choral teacher who had been caught (by me) hitting on a 9th grader, would probably stick up for me when the rest of them were talking behind my back. Oh, and the Vice Principal, Mr. Hudson? After receiving that anonymous letter in the mail making mention of his gambling addiction and how he used the entire Latin Club’s savings ($12,449.98) that was meant for a trip to Europe for horse racing instead…?

Well, he’d probably let me keep my job forever.

I would dissuade students from graduate school (“a waste of time…”), argue vehemently against going to other less-fortunate countries to help build housing for the homeless (“way too hot, zero nightlife…”), make up rumors about Ivy league colleges (“a breeding ground for rapists and chicken-wraps…”), put down the ‘creative arts’ (“writers end up becoming alcoholics…”) and even sully the ultimate job of President of the United States (“the health benefits are for sh*t…”).

I wouldn’t do it for you. I wouldn’t do it for the school. I wouldn’t even do it because certain career-fillers were handing me under the table cash for getting smart kids to do dumb jobs. I would do it because it would be fun.

And because I would be evil.

Posted under Education, Guidance Counselor, What If. |